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Outside of genetic predisposition, poor diet, and lack of exercise, there are a variety of reasons why ADD symptoms may arise in children, adults, and even the elderly.

Below are 5 of the most common factors that are often overlooked.

1. Head Injury

One of the most common (and most overlooked) causes of ADD symptoms is long-forgotten or unrecognized head injury, especially to the front part of the brain. In our experience, many professionals and parents underestimate the impact of head injuries, assuming that a person needs to have a significant loss of consciousness for a prolonged period of time in order for it to do damage. Our brain imaging work, along with the work of others, is disproving this notion.

Lack of oxygen causes a decrease in overall brain activity while brain infections, such as meningitis or encephalitis, cause toxic inflammation in the brain, damage tissue, and impair healthy blood flow.

Exposure to mold, pesticides, lead, mercury, intrauterine smoking, and other toxins have also been linked to various neurodevelopmental disorders. This factor is very important to understand and evaluate, as a different approach, including a biomedical evaluation, is often warranted.

Many symptoms of depression and anxiety are also found in ADD, so history is the key to proper diagnosis and treatment. ADD symptoms are generally constant over time, while depression and anxiety tend to fluctuate. Unfortunately, many people with ADD experience chronic anxiety and develop depressive symptoms due to the constant demoralization that goes with having ADD.

Hormones play a major role in ADD, and symptoms are generally worse around the time of puberty in both males and females. In females, ADD symptoms are often worsened during the pre-menstrual period and also around the time of menopause.

Those with a sense of humor outlived those who didn’t find life funny (the survival edge was particularly large for people with cancer).

Adults who scored in the top quarter for humor appreciation were 35% more likely to be alive than those in the bottom quarter.

In a subgroup of folks who had a cancer diagnosis at the start, a great sense of humor cut their chances of death by about 70% compared with adults with a poor sense of humor.

Becky Johnson, a witty author and friend of mine, whose new humor memoir, We Laugh, We Cry, We Cook(co-authored with her daughter) may give your brain a happy boost through literary laughter therapy.

Becky is also a good friend of The Amen Clinic, and even wrote about her experience getting a brain scan!

In the book, Becky writes, “A few years ago, I had a brain scan done at the Amen Clinic. The good news is, contrary to urban myth, I do have a brain! In fact, according to Dr. Amen… I have “a beautiful brain.” On my brain scan, however, there is what appears to be a dent in my forehead. This is not an actual hole in my head, but an indication that blood flow is in not hurry to infuse my prefrontal cortex with thinking fluid. The result is that I’ve gone through my entire life with something called Inattentive ADD. It basically means that, though I am a bright and creative thinker, I am simultaneously ditzy and absentminded, at least when it comes to remembering things like time and appointments and where I put my glasses, or getting jokes, which mostly fly over my head at the speed of light.”

Becky once told me, “Having a sense of humor has helped me not to take myself too seriously. And being funny has helped my loved ones to see me as more endearing than irritating. Sometimes it feels like there is a classroom of Kindergarteners in my brain, all doing their own thing. Jumping on chairs, hollering out the window, coloring on the walls. This product helps bring the class-in-my head to order, and gives me the ability to focus on one project at a time and get it done.”

Laughter helps you learn.

One of the reasons I use humor in my presentations is to help people relax, because when we are relaxed and laughing, your ability to learn and absorb information increases. Try lowering your stress with some funny movies, or grab a copy of We Laugh, We Cry, We Cook and enjoy some chuckles.

We understand that not everyone can make it into one of our clinics for treatment, so it’s very important that we extend our support to you and your family in every way possible.

If you think that you or a loved may have ADD, take Dr. Amen’s new online questionnaire to learn more. After determining your type, you will receive a full, comprehensive report including an ADD Action Plan with natural and targeted treatments that you can start from home.

Did you know that there are multiple types of ADD and that one treatment does not fit everyone? When ADD is misdiagnosed, left untreated — or worse — treated improperly . . . it can ruin your life:

According to one study from Harvard, 52% of untreated people abuse drugs or alcohol.

33% of untreated teens never finish high school – 3 times the national average – so they end up in jobs that do not pay well.

Parents of ADD children divorce 3 times more often than the general population.

Having raised 3 ADD kids, I know that there can be a lot of love in ADD families, but there can also be a lot of chaos, frustration, and tears.

Having ineffectively treated ADD is also very expensive as people go from doctor to doctor and try multiple medications, which often do more harm than good.

But it doesn’t have to be this way!

I’ll tell you why…

Using a functional brain imaging study called SPECT, my colleagues and I have literally looked at the brain activity of tens of thousands of people with ADD.

This is what we have discovered and what you need to know:

There are 7 distinct types of ADD- not just the simple types: ADD and ADHD.

We’ve seen thousands of transformational stories and have effective solutions –many of which are natural and lifestyle methods that can be started from home– to dramatically improve you and your loved one’s lives in a short period of time.

If you believe that ADD is affecting you or a loved one, there are 3 steps to take today:

Know whether you or your loved one is likely to have ADD.

Learn which type (or types) may be present.

Discover the right types of treatment, targeted to your specific ADD brain type.

More than 100 million people worldwide suffer from depression, and it is thought an estimated 70-90% either do not receive sufficient medical treatment, do not respond to therapy, or do not have access to quality care. As a result, there is an immense unmet need for alternative, economical, and effective strategies for treating major and minor depression.

New research supports an age-old concept for lifting depression. It is also safe, low-cost, and self-administered. It is called Positive Activity Intervention (PAI) which is a fancy term for doing what many of our grandmothers and great-grandmothers would have advised in year’s past: participating in positive activities like counting your blessings.

The authors of the study found that PAIs, such as counting one’s blessings, practicing optimism, performing acts of kindness, and using one’s unique strengths, “teach patients ways to increase their positive cognitions, emotions, and behaviors without professional help.”

Journal Editor, Kim A Jobst said, “This is ground-breaking work of global significance. It applies in all cultures at all times but especially in our pharmaceutically dominated culture of dependence. Because it is in many ways common sense, it is all the more important to have scientific validation and more low cost highly effective means to help people submerged in the sea of depression.”

Dr. Daniel Amen‘s research on the brain has found that depression comes in a variety of types and there is not a one-size-fits all cure. However almost everyone can receive positive benefits from nourishing the brain with healthy food and exercise, alongside positive thoughts and actions. I encourage everyone to learn how to fight the ANTs (automatic negative thoughts in their brain) and embrace thoughts of gratitude and realistic positivity. Supplements like fish oil and Vitamin D can further boost mood levels.

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” John 16:33 (NIV)

As January draws to a close, the memories of Christmas begin to fade. For many folks January is a hard month. After all, It follows the most festive time of the year. It’s a time when expectations are high and may or may not have come true. Ironically, sometimes the joy of Christmas leave us feeling the “letdown”. It is a time when the experience of Christmas may remind us of the disappointments of this world. Yes, even at one of the most festive, beautiful , meaningful times of the year. We have such high expectations in the things of this world and recapturing the child-like awe of Christmas is something we all long for. The lights, the packages, and the tinsel most likely will never have the same effect on us as adults as it does when we were young.

I remember as a young child lying under the tree… you know when you first put it up and there are no presents yet? I would look up into the tree (hey and remember this was back in the 70s) and our tree was a white “flocked tree” with green and blue balls and lights. It was beautiful and so “groovy”. I loved the way the lights reflected off of the balls and how peaceful and beautiful it looked up inside the tree. However, no matter how many trees I crawl under these days, I will never see it the same way. I have seen too much pain, known too much disappointment. It is time for me to let go of the things of my childhood and become that person that passes down my hope, my love, and my joy to the younger generations. This world is a fallen world; we will never be as innocent as when we were young. Our hearts know too much now.

Christmas is for children…they deserve happy times, lights and tinsel. Children live in the innocence of the Garden or at least as close to it as possible in this fallen world. Albeit this innocence lasts for only a short time. Therefore, Christmas lights and a new toy can make a child’s Christmas, this changes as we get older. Innocent activities become more difficult because not only do we learn more about the struggles of this world, we are exposed more to the evil of this world. Our hearts start to long for more, to see the broken ways that people relate to one another, the influences of evil on this world and our hearts begin to yearn for something better. We strive to make it better because it can be so disappointing. We end up working 5x harder to get what we think will make everyone, including ourselves happy, only to find out that happiness is fleeting.

Re-read the verse at the top of this writing from John 16:33. It tells us to “TAKE HEART” for He has overcome this world! God offers us so much more than this world; He offers us hope and joy! The hope in knowing that this is not our home and the joy of realizing what is to come…the ultimate gift of all! I am so grateful to God that He gave me the glimpses of the Christmas tree that I had when I was a child. Why? Because, now I know that as a child that Christmas tree caught my gaze, whereas soon, the streets paved with gold, and the Glory of the Lord will shine so brightly that there will be no comparison. I can only imagine that someday I will be staring into the face of Christ, seeing the awesome beauty of Heaven, and remember the lights of the Christmas tree and they will be a distant, sweet memory. Keep your eyes on heaven where your true happiness will be complete!

Christmas is all over. The gifts have been opened. The decorations put away. The New Year is here. The fireworks are spent. All the traditions of celebration are gone. Now, it’s time to get back to work. Time to put all that stuff away and get back to the grindstone.

Of course, the exact opposite is true for many. The holidays weren’t a time of great joy or celebration. You may have all sorts of family drama or for whatever reason Christmas is not very festive. Getting back to work is exactly what you have been looking forward to for those weeks while everyone else seemed to be smiling it up.

There are still others who don’t have any work to return to. You’ve been out of work so long it sounds like a fairy tale. Christmas, the gift-giving and receiving, has just been another unwelcome reminder that you don’t have a regular paycheck.

No matter what category you fall into, we can all use a good dose of perspective. What is God’s unchanging view? What is really important and how does that translate into my day-to-day activities?

What comes to mind for me is to focus on the eternal first and surrender the rest of it to God’s control. So what are those eternal things?

I have heard it said that only two things will be in heaven:

Jesus

People

That boils down to one word – relationships.

I want my life to be rich in relationships – both with Jesus and others. So while I am packing away the trimmings from the holidays, I am reflecting and mentally packing away the baggage that the holidays can carry. All the family drama, the resentments, hurts and disappointments – I am putting into God’s able hands and seeking His power to surrender and forgive. I am making a mental checklist of all the folks I need to mend things with. I have some awkward conversations to have and some new habits/routines to establish with my wife and kids.

What I am realizing is that the work I need to get back to won’t earn me a paycheck. I am back to work of course, trying to make ends meet. But my heart is mostly wrapped up with the work of repairing, deepening and forming relationships. My connections with Jesus my Savior and other people are the only things that will endure into eternity.

Recent studies have found that exercise is not only beneficial to your physical health, but your mental health as well. This has prompted mental health clinicians to rethink treatment strategies and to consider the possibility of exercise not just in therapy but as therapy.

“Above and beyond the standard benefits of exercise in healthy living and general well-being, there is strong evidence demonstrating the ability of exercise to in fact treat mental illness and have significant benefits on a neurotrophic, neurobiologic basis,” Dr. Douglas Noordsy, associate professor and director of psychosis services at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College, in Hanover, New Hampshire.

Some of the strongest evidence is seen in depression, where psychiatric benefits from exercise have been shown in some cases to match those achieved with pharmacologic interventions and to persist to prevent remission in the long term.

Dr. Noordsy referenced a study from researchers at Duke University in which 156 patients with major depressive disorder (MDD) were randomly assigned either to aerobic exercise, sertraline therapy, or both for 4 months. The difference in remission rates for either group after 4 months were not significant – 60% and 69%, respectively, but at a 10-month follow-up, those that were exercising showed a significantly lower relapse rate. In fact patients that were exercising on their own after the treatment period had half the chance of meeting the depression criteria 6 months later compared to patients who didn’t exercise after the 4-month study.

A similar study from the same group of researchers 10 years later in a larger sample involving 202 patients assigned to supervised exercise, sertraline therapy (50 mg to 200 mg) or placebo showed remission rates of 46% at 4 months and 66% at the 16-month follow-up across both treatment groups, with no significant greater improvement with SSRIs compared with exercise in predicting MDD remission at 1 year.

Other studies have shown equally impressive results in exercise for a variety of populations, including pregnant women with depression, who have a high interest in avoiding medications, people with HIV, and even patients with heart failure, who showed not only a significant reduction in depression related to exercise but also reduced mortality.

In addition to being an effective therapy for treating depression, exercise has also been seen to help with anxiety. While the evidence in relation to anxiety is not quite as strong, it still suggests a benefit particularly with rigorous cardiovascular workouts to address the physiologic effects associated with anxiety.

“We know that with anxiety, the heart rate goes up, you start breathing fast, and it kind of snowballs with more anxiety, and that can trigger a panic attack,” Dr. Noordsy explained. “So one of the important positive effects of physical exercise is it allows people to become conditioned to having their heart rate and respiratory rate increase when they’re not associated with anxiety, thereby addressing the triggers.”

In regard to other psychiatric disorders such as bipolar disorder, the evidence is somewhat, but patients often have symptoms similar enough to depression to suggest a benefit, Dr. Noordsy said. “The evidence on depression in bipolar disorder is strong enough that I certainly feel comfortable in talking about exercise as part of bipolar patients’ management.”

In terms of more serious psychotic disorders such as schizophrenia, evidence is limited on benefits of exercise for the core symptoms of psychosis or cognition. However, several studies have shown improvement in comorbidities and metabolic issues related to antipsychotics that such patients commonly face.

One study of a jogging intervention among 80 inpatients with chronic schizophrenia, in which 40 patients jogged for 40 minutes 3 times a week, depression, anxiety, phobia, and obsessive-compulsive behaviors declined significantly compared with 40 inpatient control participants who were inactive and showed no improvement.

The evidence on the benefits of exercise in cognitive function disorders, such as dementia and Alzheimer’s disease, is much more extensive, with as many as 8 strong studies on dementia alone in the last 3 years showing improvements with activities such as walking and strength training on memory and executive function.

Dr. Noordsy noted one particularly remarkable study in which researchers compared patients with and without the ApoE gene, which is linked strongly to late-onset Alzheimer’s disease. In the study, patients who were ApoE-negative showed similarly low mean cortical binding potential, related to plaque buildup in the brain, regardless of whether they exercised or not. But although ApoE-positive individuals had values that were substantially higher, the ApoE-positive patients who exercised had values similar to those who did not carry the gene. “You could look at these results and rightfully say physical exercise neutralizes your risk for developing Alzheimer’s disease if you’re ApoE positive,” Dr. Noordsy said.

How to Get Patients Moving

Perhaps the biggest caveat with all mental health conditions is how to motivate patients who are struggling with psychiatric disorders to exercise.

Dr. Noordsy offered some key suggestions:

Start with an assessment of lifetime history of activity and current activity then educate the patient on the potential effects of exercise on their disorder and how it fits on the menu of other treatment options.

Make clear recommendations. For example there is a lot of evidence in areas such as smoking cessation and in the addiction literature showing that a substantial subset of people will respond to very clear recommendations.

Offer motivational tools such a behavioral planner that allows for goal setting. Connecting a patient with an exercise group can be helpful as well.

Consider the patient’s current activity capacity in recommending a regimen. The general amount of exercise believed to result in a benefit is about 30 to 60 minutes per day, between 3 and 7 days per week. Some studies have shown strength training to be as beneficial as aerobic activity.

Help the patient find an activity that works best for them, rather than recommending anything specific.

Guide the patient to educational resources, such as information sources or books on exercise and the brain.

Importantly, discussing the role of exercise in the context of human evolution might be a more effective approach with patients than the standard recommendation to get some exercise. For example, our ancestors hunted animals for food, tended to their gardens, built their own homes and walked wherever they need to go. Physical exercise was what our bodies were designed to do and when we don’t do it our bodies and brains fall apart.

Another important component in helping patients benefit from exercise is simply to improve awareness among other clinicians which underlines the importance of this article and why I’m sharing it with all of you. Now get up and get moving! Your brain and body will thank you for it.

We are just four days from the New Year and with the New Year comes a new batch of resolutions! From losing weight to changing careers, this time of year we tend to make promises to ourselves and hope like heck that we keep them (nearly 9 out of 10 resolutions go unfulfilled). Failed resolutions can lead to depression, self loathing and disappointment, so here are five pieces of advice to help you stick to your resolution this year.

Write Them Down – By writing out your goals, you are making a contract with yourself which usually sparks a personal motivation to achieve them.

Be Specific – Getting in shape can mean a lot of different things. If getting in shape to you means being able to run a ½ marathon by September, then make running a ½ marathon by September your resolution – not getting in shape.

Get Social – Teaming up with others is particularly powerful, given our social natures and reluctance to let other folks down.

Share your Resolutions – The truth is, no one achieves much if they work entirely alone. By allowing others to help, you not only increase your chances of success, you also reinforce your relationship with them.

Expect Missteps – Just because you missed one day at the gym doesn’t mean your hard work has been for naught. Some folks consider such slip-ups tremendously deflating, which leads them to abandon their goal entirely. One way to avoid that is to imagine—before you embark on a resolution—a wide range of ways it may turn out, then ask yourself how you would react to each.

Making a professional New Year’s resolution for your company can be a great way to motivate and engage employees throughout the New Year. Using the tips above, we hope that your resolution can be one of the 10% that actually sticks this year. If it doesn’t, don’t beat yourself up – we love you just the way you are!

We are just four days from the New Year and with the New Year comes a new batch of resolutions! From losing weight to changing careers, this time of year we tend to make promises to ourselves and hope like heck that we keep them (nearly 9 out of 10 resolutions go unfulfilled). Failed resolutions can lead to depression, self loathing and disappointment, so here are five pieces of advice to help you stick to your resolution this year.

Write Them Down – By writing out your goals, you are making a contract with yourself which usually sparks a personal motivation to achieve them.

Be Specific – Getting in shape can mean a lot of different things. If getting in shape to you means being able to run a ½ marathon by September, then make running a ½ marathon by September your resolution – not getting in shape.

Get Social – Teaming up with others is particularly powerful, given our social natures and reluctance to let other folks down.

Share your Resolutions – The truth is, no one achieves much if they work entirely alone. By allowing others to help, you not only increase your chances of success, you also reinforce your relationship with them.

Expect Missteps – Just because you missed one day at the gym doesn’t mean your hard work has been for naught. Some folks consider such slip-ups tremendously deflating, which leads them to abandon their goal entirely. One way to avoid that is to imagine—before you embark on a resolution—a wide range of ways it may turn out, then ask yourself how you would react to each.

Making a professional New Year’s resolution for your company can be a great way to motivate and engage employees throughout the New Year. Using the tips above, we hope that your resolution can be one of the 10% that actually sticks this year. If it doesn’t, don’t beat yourself up – we love you just the way you are!

When I was a kid I was easily excitable. Okay, overly excitable. I was frequently called “hyperactive.” The approach of Christmas was more than my limited ability to control myself could handle. During the month of December, when the hymns changed to Christmas carols, I became so wired that I vibrated the entire pew as I attempted to sit through church. People chose to avoid or join the row I sat on based on whether they feared motion sickness or hoped to get a free, vibrating massage during the service.By Christmas eve I was entirely unable to sleep. I tried desperately to fall asleep so Christmas would be there sooner. But the minutes ticked by like hours. When I did fall asleep I would wake two or three hours later, say at 4:00 in the morning. There was no way I was falling asleep again, I was ready to bolt to the living room. That’s why my parents locked me in the basement on Christmas eve. I am not kidding; my siblings and I were locked in the basement until my parents awoke and set us free.

When I was 14, I decided that I did not want to spend another Christmas eve staring at the ceiling. So I played it cool. No joining in singing when a Christmas song came on the radio. No wondering what I would get that year. I ignored all the festivities around me. On Christmas eve, just as I’d hoped, I was able to fall asleep easily. It was a younger sibling, not myself, that woke me up the next morning. Then I went upstairs to greet the joy of Christmas morning. Except…it wasn’t there. Try as I might, I could not get excited about Christmas that year. I had killed Christmas, and it was my own doing.

We’ve all been there; too busy, not enough money, people arguing over tiny things. In spite of it all, I am trying to be excited this year. I sing with the carols and try to let little things go. It’s not going to be a perfect Christmas, probably not even close. But I hope I am up all night staring at the ceiling anyway.